Printing in the Digital World

August 27, 2014

Many print options are available to consumers and commercial firms that want to mass produce and mass distribute their products and/or marketing materials. Understanding the advantages and disadvantages to the two mainstays is critical to achieving results and meeting expectations for your company’s return on investment, especially when print solutions play a significant role in a company’s marketing efforts.

Offset Printing

Traditionally, offset printing has been the forerunner of the print industry. For years, when printing large quantities of identical pieces, offset printing has been the way to go. Offset printers produce consistent, high-quality images, but they have longer set up times, which equates to higher fees. It is a very cost-effective method for large runs without variation, but not for short runs or runs with a lot of variable data.

If a customer needs one consistent image or document to be recreated 100,000 times over, offset printing produces these results. However, what happens when you want Gabriel in Salt Lake City and Gabby in Nashville to receive a personalized letter with a varied color palette and a different message entirely? If you want to double those variations to go to 4 people or change it up for 10,000 different people, all with different variations, offset printing quickly becomes a very cumbersome and expensive option.

Digital Printing

Gabby and Gabriel need the product you sell, but they each have a different background, age, and culture. The message might target Gabby perfectly, but Gabriel remains unmoved. Do you change the entire product? All you really need to do is change the message for Gabriel.

With digital printing, varying the message for each individual customer is possible. This is the specialty digital printing has to offer that offset printing cannot. On any one press sheet, you can produce a variety of art, color, and data. Most digital printers can handle various types of paper stock, just as their offset counterparts can, but they also provide the ability to print variable data at the same time quicker and more affordably than offset.

Personalization Is Key

In the targeted-marketing industry, digital printing is invaluable because reaching select clientele is no longer cost prohibitive. While offset printing can provide cheaper printing solutions for bulk orders, digital printing will produce a larger return on investment. Targeted messages simply get better results.

It’s important to understand which print option is optimal for your company. When looking for the right printing solution, speak with a professional about what options are available. If you need a consultation about your marketing efforts and want to know what digital variable data printing can offer, give us a call today. We have marketing professionals available to answer your questions and help fulfill your company’s growing needs.